


An Inducement To Merriment

by chewsdaychillin



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Class Differences, Getting Together, Historical AU, Implied Period Typical Homophobia, M/M, Martim Week 2021 (The Magnus Archives), Martim week: AU, dancing together owo, flirting a lot of flirting, making out in a genre typical location no spoilers, regency au, vague sexual references
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-14 03:53:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29412219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chewsdaychillin/pseuds/chewsdaychillin
Summary: In an odd turn of events, there was a party at Lucas lodge that night.theyre mlm and they wear cravats what will they do ..
Relationships: (canon typical one sided pining/pre relationship), Martin Blackwood & Jonathan Sims, Martin Blackwood/Tim Stoker
Comments: 10
Kudos: 29
Collections: Martim Week 2021





	An Inducement To Merriment

**Author's Note:**

> martim week dat 6 ! sad the week is nearly over 😩 but this is one of my faves owo. i wrote this in a bridgerton induced rage coupled with a persuasion induced love <3

In an odd turn of events, there was a party at Lucas lodge that night. The whole downstairs - the drawing room, the parlour, the veranda with its tasteful pillars and climbing vines, was alight with lanterns and smiles, just as a party ought to be. It was all very busy to those accustomed to the house standing deserted, and had been the talk of the town. To the staff who were used to spending hours dusting its large empty rooms, everything seemed far smaller, and yet more impossible to traverse when cramped with blazing coloured coats. 

The only thing that was not odd about it was that the Lukases themselves were not in attendance. 

They fancied themselves fashionable, and were, as those with fine houses fit for hosting were want to be, veritable snobs about these sorts of things. So, however unsociable and taciturn they were themselves in  _ person,  _ they refused not to stand on ceremony on hearing the militia had arrived into town. They would recluse themselves to the cottage, and leave the staff to set up a fine dinner and dancing for the redcoats, who would then pass on a good work about town that the Lukas Lodge party had been one of the finest of their experience, undoubtedly down to its charitable hosts. 

It was now that this, the most excellent of hostless parties, was thoroughly underway, and dinner had been cleared to make space for dancing, that those truly responsible for throwing it were slowly starting to trickle out. 

Sasha had kindly volunteered to stay through to the end, and had roped a few of the others into remaining with her, which meant Martin was now very nearly free to leave caring for tipsy party guests and head home to care for someone who was, somehow, even less receptive to his ministrations. 

He took the veranda on the way out, which allowed him an open view into the drawing room through the large, open French windows. 

It was yellow, bright, happy, and far too crowded for him to feel jealous about being out in the August air. Still, he hovered slightly, taking it all in from his safe distance behind one of the garden’s many Grecian pillars. It made a pretty sight, and he could take pride in his and Sasha's work in decorating the room if nothing else. There was muslin to admire, and lace and beading, and the gossiping faces and accompanying gasps of the wealthy always made for amusing theatre. 

It was as his mind slipped into thinking that there were also a great many handsome gentlemen, what with the militia being the guests of honour, that he heaved himself away from the sight, and was about to go when he heard footsteps and a voice calling behind him. 

It was one of those handsome gentlemen who had appeared at his elbow, and Martin smiled even as he startled. 

‘Lord, Jon, don’t sneak-!’

‘You are not staying?’ Jonathan Sims asked, somehow, as always, managing to sound both disapproving and somehow a little plaintive. 

It was to both these tones that Martin answered patiently. ‘I ought to go home to my mother. I have been away too long as it is, what with all the excitement.’ 

Jon frowned as stiffly as his high white collar was starched against his cheeks, but Martin had known him long enough to find any scowls or prim expressions he made at social events to be rather amusing, especially when he was wrapped up uncomfortably in all his finest layers. It was not that they did not become him - in fact, the opposite was true, but this truth was, as always, being resolutely ignored - merely that he insisted on showing every slight annoyance in a way that his stiffened frock coats always emphasised, and served bestow his out of place look with an endearing quality. 

Martin gave him a sympathetic shrug, for there was little else he could be expected to do about their respective situations. This evidently did not satisfy. 

‘You toil all day to put on this merriment and will not partake of it yourself?’ 

‘I never thought the day should come that  _ you  _ would be inducing me to merriment.’ 

‘Well I suppose there must be a first time for everything, since you shall not induce yourself,’ Jon huffed. ‘You will not dance?’

‘You know I  _ cannot _ as well as ought not to,’ Martin reminded him fondly. ‘The only thing worse than the staff making an appearance is the staff treading on ladies’ toes.’ 

He gestured vaguely down the hill to his final tasks, but in the following quiet, he did almost hope to be prevailed on again, as was the way with their friendly bond of equal stubbornness. A further inducement, Martin reasoned, would only be rude to ignore, and though he would not be persuaded to attempt a single dance, he was prepared to suffer the guilt of being late home for a moment’s quiet conversation, and perhaps a drink, in the bright of the drawing room. Questions would be asked and heads turned if the staff took to the floor, but he could at least, if asked again, rely on Jon’s insistence as his excuse, and perhaps delude himself into thinking it a kindness that reflected his own warm feelings towards the man. The sort that were as flattered as a maid’s by invitation, and charmed, as very few else were, by his awkward and obdurate manners.

But he was not asked again. 

Instead Jon only sighed and turned reluctantly to gesture inside. ‘I’m afraid I am bid to come and ask for at least your company by my friend Captain Stoker. And you must trust me when I say that he takes his stubbornness as seriously as you do. Almost as seriously as he takes his merriment.’ 

The man to whom he pointed had the brown and lined face of one who has been a long time at sea, though smiling rather most of the time. In this regard alone he was not a traditional beauty. In every other respect however, from the grace of his standing to his warm eyes and easy manners, his fine calves and the handsome cut of his jaw against his collar, he was a decidedly, objectively good looking man in a way that made Martin extremely nervous at the prospect of his company, for a number of reasons. 

Firstly, as disappointed as he was that Jon had not insisted more heartily on their sharing a turn about the rooms, and in fact that he had been sent to Martin’s side on a mission that was not his own, Martin could not help the thing inside him that thrilled with even being considered by the striking redcoat. This feeling, which he had long since learned to recognise in himself, was one that he tended to try and ignore the presence of for his own wellbeing and soundness of mind. Lonely longing from afar had been his lot in life as long he could remember, and it did no good for his health nor his nerves to indulge it. He was not always particularly successful in this, as his general excitement of feeling whenever Jon rode over to visit the lodge or stalked into town on some errand would attest to. But that was quite decided now, and had become a fact of life that was as easy to ignore as it was hard to live with. There was little Martin could do to reckon with  _ that  _ particular affliction. He now resolved at least to never again be introduced to handsome men, lest he succeed in driving himself once more into a fit of misery. 

This alone was enough to make him nervous of the captain’s request, but he knew a personal misery confined to his poetry was as lucky as men in his same position tended to get. Hence his general nerves at being introduced to any strange man, particularly of military profession, who might harbour hostility towards his proclivities, was marred with his anxiety around somehow betraying himself around any men that he warmed to. He did not think himself so pronounced in airs as to draw attention, at least he had survived this far without anyone suspecting him of being more than simply the outcast they made him. Still, he stood out in the village for his reading, and in a fine room such as this for his obvious lack of it, and he had the unlucky sensitivity that felt every eye. In a ballroom where any number of people might see any expression that crossed his face or graced his movements, the vague threats that spun into calcified certainties in his imagination were only heightened. 

And besides, he told himself, there was certainly no reason to suspect he had been called over for anything other than some game or sport of teasing. Jon was a friend, and there was trust between them enough that Martin did not suspect a trap on his part, but he did not know the stranger, and there was a gleam in his grin that suggested he was fond of the sort of rousing fun that Martin was always glad to excuse himself from. This seemed far more likely to be the reason for his invitation, he reasoned, since, though he could flatter himself that Jon thought him decent company, he could not take seriously any consideration that he might have been recommended kindly. Neither could he entertain the possibility of being singled out by the captain in the same way  _ he  _ had noticed  _ him,  _ for he knew himself to be a plain, freckled thing, ruddy and thick with work, not at all befitting the snobbery of Lukas lodge or the elegance of the its gentlemen guests. 

No, there was a molly house not three towns over where he might partake in merriment privately, and without harming his prospects, and that would do very well for all, except perhaps his stubborn heart, which would remain here. 

He shook his head. ‘I’m afraid your friend will be disappointed.’ 

He then turned to go, and only was stopped by the force of his own stifled gasp as Jon tapped weakly on his elbow to bid him stay. He returned to the pillar, and could resist neither the desperate look in Jon’s eyes at having to return to his friend empty handed, nor the way he caught the captain looking over at them when he glanced inside. 

The man’s dark eyes and tanned complexion were so very fine against the red of his coat. 

Martin allowed his stubbornness to weaken just slightly, and only hoped that it would not change the course of anyone’s evening except his own, which would no doubt be spent regretting this decision. 

‘Then,’ he said, taking as much joy in teasingly mimicking Jon’s stiff invitations as did in the substance of his words, ‘you may tell the captain that I will be at the stables for a half hour, and thereafter I am sworn to return home. If he is so desirous of my company he shall have to brave the ire of Mr Lukas’s ponies.’ 

Then he said goodnight and turned away for good. 

The stables were very quiet. Despite the message he only half expected Jon to actually deliver, the Lukas’s ponies were a good sort once bribed with their supper, and they stood still and unbothered as Martin checked their backs and legs, only putting up a little resistance as he pushed them further into the stalls to sweep up. Lively music drifted gently down the hill from the party, muffled only slightly by the breeze across the grass. 

It was over this peaceful drift of a dance and the otherwise still of the night that Martin heard the swish of boots through the grass. Looking up, he promptly recognised the man Jon had singled out as Captain Stoker, and resolved to hide himself as much as possible. It was unfortunate that the only place he could find was behind Penny and Buttercup, for they were only fourteen hands, and served to make him feel quite ridiculous. 

Still the captain approached, and as he reached the yard, he called his greeting over the stable door and over two ponies, so there was something to be said for his commitment. 

Martin had thought about pretending his entire conversation with Jon had never occurred, but he could see from the recognition in the man’s grin that that was not going to happen. Instead he idly picked his way through knots in Penny’s mane, and chose a dry and arched tone he thought suited his disinterest and skepticism quite well. 

‘Are you really so determined to mock a poor and tired servant?’

‘Mock?’ The grinning soldier asked. ‘Who said anything about mocking?’

‘Then why, sir, should you have cause to follow me down here and distract me from my essential works?’ This declaration received a raised eyebrow, but Martin ignored it and reached pointedly for the broom. 

It was harder to ignore the eyes on his back as he pushed the ponies’ bedding back into shape - busy work, something to do with his hands. With his back turned, he had a chance to school his features somewhat at the next words uttered by his determined companion. 

‘Jon speaks highly of your manners.’

‘Manners?’ He turned then. ‘I think you’ll find me rather lacking, sir. I’m sure I have no idea where he got that idea from, given that I rarely speak to him with any.’ 

‘Well, but that is my very point!’ Cried the captain. There is far too much formality in these parts of the world, and one gets so dreadfully sick of it all when one spends one’s time entirely around captains and generals and-’ He waved his hand to a stop, before shrugging and continuing. ‘Tim is the name my parents gave me, and I like to think it suits me as well as any.’ 

He said it with such an easy charm that it seemed natural to cut across the proprietary distance between them and swan into christian names just like that, as if it wasn’t something that had taken Martin months to get to even with Jon. But he was right - their situation was so uniquely strange and new that it would have felt even stranger to keep insisting on sirs. Martin smiled and conceded that Tim was a good name, and he lent on Penny’s withers comfortably to give his own back and receive a similar compliment.

From then he found that they conversed very easily, and the nerves that had threatened were only to be found at the very back of Martin's mind. He explained the planning of the party and Tim pronounced it excellent, although they frankly traded a mutual dislike of the Lukases. The frankly traded a lot, in fact, with very little in the way of airs and graces. It was, simply, as refreshing a conversation as one can find at a party somewhere as pompous as Lukas Lodge, and the setting only helped the easy feeling to grow between them. 

Eventually all the necessary sweeping that could be invented was finished, and still they conversed, now leaning either side of the stable door. 

‘If I may speak frankly,’ Tim said, ‘I think it rather unfair of Jon to keep you all to himself.’

Martin flushed viciously. ‘He does no such thing,’ he insisted with a spot of bitterness. ‘And if I may speak frankly I think you rather brazen.’

‘Well, if we may speak frankly I think you very handsome.’

Martin blinked, trying hard to think of any sort of witty retort or even a simple rebuttal. Then he swallowed. Then slowly said ‘ _ me?’ _

Tim crossed his arms over the stable door and leaned his chin on them so that he was looking up. ‘Yes. I never could much hold with the idea that the outdoors does not suit a man.’

‘No. Me neither.’

It was all very odd, Martin decided as his chest rose and fell heavily in the stall. But, as much as he disliked change, it was nice to receive any sort of kind attention. He knew he was very red in the darkness and only hoped Tim would not judge him harshly for it.

It seemed he did not, for it was then that he chose to unbolt the stable door and swing it open in invitation. ‘Then you will consent to join me in the next?’

The air following such a declaration seemed to pulse with a feverous current, and Martin paused, keeping his distance from the open door. The ponies did not stir. Nothing seemed amis in the house. From here he could even make out the veranda, which was figureless and undisturbed. No one had heard them. Nothing seemed false in Tim’s face. And yet there was the omnipresent feeling of tension, as though a baited hook was dangled in front of him. This seemed dangerous. 

Inwardly, he could think of a thousand reasons to say no. Outwardly the only excuse he gave was ‘I do not know the steps.’

This was no detriment to Tim’s enthusiasm. On the contrary, it seemed to give him boundless joy and a perfect excuse to offer up his hand. 

Another glance towards the house gave Martin the courage to take it, and as the strings warmed up he was led out of the stall and back onto the deserted little yard, heart catching all the while. There Tim lined them up and did a very fine impression of a coquettish curtsy, before the music began in earnest. 

Their dance was exceptionally clumsy, a good first part of it being characterised by Martin apologising excessively as Tim attempted to guide him through the steps. Eventually though their laughter became so thorough that his lamentations of his own uselessness were entirely lost to glee. Tim focused extreme passion on any turns within the dance, spinning them both round rapidly enough to cause a dizziness that ruined the next round of steps, and this pattern of whirling and laughing and clumsiness continued through until the routine became repetitive enough that Martin could preempt him and spin him right back. 

In between the whirlwind moments and skipping circles, there were several calmer crossing steps, which were the only moments slow enough that Martin caught his breath long enough to register the points of touch between them. As they were bumping shoulders, slowly turning hand in hand, or stepping side by side with their arms brushing, he very much felt every inch of contact, as dizzying as the spins. 

Then another measure would come along and they’d be laughing once more through a fast round of turning and twisting under each other’s arms. 

By the time the dance ended they were both quite out of breath, and as the applause from the house faded and descended into quiet, and the quiet went on, it became more and more difficult to attribute this to the rigour of dancing. Still they continued to stand there, and Martin would have wandered that he hadn’t caught a chill, had he not known even before he raised the back of his hand to his cheek, that his face was still hot, and likely flushed as a debutante’s. 

He dropped his hand quickly, and was about to say something to retreat once more into safety, but before he could quite formulate the once familiar and now apparently inaccessible excuse of returning home, Tim reached out and took up his hand again. His fingertips had the calloused firmness of a military workload, but had all the gentleness a gentleman ought to have with none of the condescension as he lifted Martin’s hand and bent to press his mouth there.

‘Thank you,’ he said quietly. 

How things progressed from this to kissing heavily in the back of the stall, Martin was sure he would not remember in the morning. There had been some sudden lunge, probably, and a great deal of fumbling behind him for the bolt, but the specifics were very much lost in his other concerns. What he hoped more than anything he would remember in the morning was the heavy press of lips, hard and then giving way to the hot slick push of tongues, the insistently curious wandering of hands around his waist, the tug of them on his hips with the simultaneous push back against the wall that seemed quite in conflict while making perfect sense.

It was far later than Martin had ever intended on staying when they slowed enough to speak, and between their panting breaths he could hear the distinct lack of music coming from the house, replaced by chatter and no doubt late games of cards. The roll of a few carriage wheels sounded on gravel from the other side of the house. 

Tim did not seem to hear all this, buried as he was in Martin’s neck (or, more likely, he was desirous to ignore any sound that might signal the end of their meeting, and this had inspired his current sanctuary).

Martin wavered on whether to take this up with him, but it was difficult to have a strong sense of resolve with the rare pleasure of a generous mouth against his throat. He could not wish the night over for the world. Still, he vaguely said something like ‘Tim...’ that was far enough from the sounds he would not admit to making before to make Tim lift his head. 

‘When can I see you again?’ He pressed urgently. ‘Here? Can we meet here?’

‘I  _ work _ here,’ Martin reminded him, but he laughed through the scandalised sound that had first escaped him. 

‘Where do you live?’

‘In the village-’

‘Then I’ll come there.’

‘-with my mother.’

‘Ah.’

He looked so disappointed, actually disappointed at the prospect of not having more than this had already been, that Martin felt his heart soften in a way it had not for anyone in quite the same way since he had met Jon. He smiled and stroked a hand across Tim’s cheek. 

‘Here, then,’ he said, ‘only you must wait until dark. Not this late, but after dinner-’

‘Of course,’ Tim murmured assents as he went back to kissing his favoured spots, ‘of course.’ 

‘And your secrecy-’

‘I know.’ 

‘Especially from Jon.’

Tim pulled back again, frowning. ‘Why especially from Jon?’

This question was one without an easy answer for anyone, let alone for the man who had requested Jon act as a liaison for him to presumably achieve this very moment. Martin elected to ignore it and ran his hands down the front of Tim’s unbuttoned waistcoat in an effort to distract him.

‘Or there’s plenty of woods,’ he pressed on. ‘Which might be more private. Or rather more... not my place of employment, at least.’

Tim leaned into his touch and grinned. ‘You wouldn’t mind getting your gown green?’

Martin shoved him in the chest for that in what he thought was a very gallant show of affront, before immediately stepping after him and seizing him by the collar for another kiss. The crisp linen crumpled in his fists. Whatever protestations he thought were required, it felt searingly good to wanted for more than a brush. Actually, even if it was only a brush it felt good. Tim huffed at this rapid turn of events, but he kissed back eagerly enough, and huffed again as he was eventually eased back a second time. 

‘We really ought to go. You’ll be missed.’ 

Tim nodded reluctantly, but he acquiesced and swanned out of the stall door, holding it open with a bow that made Martin laugh despite himself as he followed Tim out. He glanced towards the house, but all seemed to be well and correct. Or, a little quieter than it was an hour ago, which was in fact a return to traditionally correct for Lukas Lodge. He dithered a little on saying goodnight, feeling as though this might all be lost to a dream once the word was uttered. 

Perhaps Tim felt the same, for instead of saying something to that same effect he said ‘ _ you’ll  _ be missed. Very much, I assure you.’

Then he smiled and began to make his way back up to the house. Of course there was a little sadness to leave their tryst over, but Martin also felt a thrill in watching him climb the hill back up to the lodge, fixing his buttons and his collar as he went. A giddiness in waiting to see if he turned round and smiling when he did. 

He carried that same warm feeling with him all the way over the stys and fields and roads back to the village, skipping and kicking at rocks with happy abandon, through pulling off the day’s sweat-stained clothes and dressing for bed. It lasted even whilst looking in on his mother’s fitful sleeping form, and the bittersweet feeling of blowing out his candle, thus ending a day that had gone far better than he could have ever hoped, was reduced only to sweet as he buried his pink face in the pillow. Sweeter still as he ran over and over the dance and the kiss until dreams of lying out on a red coat and looking blissfully up at dappled forest light took him. 

**Author's Note:**

> giving a girl a green gown means having sex outside in the grass lmao  
> a brush is a short affair  
> a molly house is like. a regency gay bar ? slash brothel?
> 
> if I'm wrong this was never a history lesson and u didn't hear it from me. judging by how popular bridgerton is people don't come to regency romances for historical accuracy anyway oop I said it at least there's no tightlacing and no stays on bare skin in this amirite!
> 
> anyways hope u enjoyed ! pwease commentë i wanna be jane austen so bad its embarrassing <3 also i hmm might write more in this kinda setting w this kinda style who knows if people like it x


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